Transcript World History - cloudfront.net

World History
Big Idea=First Humans
Essential Question: Where did humans
live? How did they live, and what
happened to them?
Prehistory
• Before humans could write and record history
researchers would depend on archeological
methods to track human development.
• The investigation of biological evidence that
these civilizations left behind.
• Archeologist dig up artifacts left behind by
these civilizations to examine how they lived.
Archeology
• The study of past civilizations and artifacts:
tools, buildings, weapons.
• Using analysis such as Radiocarbon dating
• All humans absorb C-14 from the atmosphere
leaving trace amounts of C-14.
• After death humans start losing C-14 leave a
timeline for remains that are extracted from
the earth
Anthropologist
• Use the same evidence to track the history of
civilizations and societies that have existed
throughout time.
• Fossils are plant or human remains that are
preserved in rock.
Stone age
• Archeologist have coined the phrase “Stone Age” for a
the prehistoric period when civilizations used stone to
create tools.
• The Stone age is divided into two parts old and new.
• The Old Stone or Paleolithic period lasted from 500,000
BC to 10,000 BC. BC= Before Christ…AD or Anno
Domini Latin for “In the Year of our Lord”
• Scientist indicate that 10,000 BC also marks the end of
the last ice age…glaciers covered much of N. America,
Asia, and Europe. Ocean levels dropped and exposed
much of today’s earth surface.
Paleolithic Civilizations
• Paleolithic peoples were hunters and gathers…a nomadic people
who moved with the food source.
• Hunting for food or picking wild berries or nuts.
• Small groups of 30 known as hunting bands would travel to forage
for food living in caves or shelters made of grass or branches called
Lean-tos.
• Evidence shows there was a spoken language and some of these
civilizations had used fire for warmth, cooking, and keeping animals
away.
• Tools=axes, arrows in the beginning. Then they became more
advanced and developed tools for everyday life, more specialized
for specific task such as, fishhooks, spears, scrapers.
• Cave paintings for this time period are believed to have religious
meaning to these societies.
Neolithic period
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10,000 BC – 3500 BC
Stopped moving to find food and began farming.
They domesticated animals
Raised them for food and work
Raised crops for food
Anthropologist conclude these societies developed in the Middle
East then branched out to Africa
They grew crops that were suited to the climate
Women farmed while men hunted
Permanent dwellings meant farming villages and more
sophisticated tools
Primitive governments and social orders were developed
They believed that spirits and gods controlled forces of nature, life
and death
Neolithic revolution
• The Neolithic Revolution period of human history from
8,000-4,000 BC…instead of chasing food they grew
it…systematic agriculture
• Domestication=taming animals for food and work
• Mesolithic age=middle stone age is where this gradual
shift from nomadic culture to producing food and
farming developed between 10,000 BC and 7,000 BC
• Crops=Barley in Europe, wheat in Africa along the Nile
Valley…both domesticated animal
• Mesoamericans occupied Central America and
Mexico…grew maize, beans, squash
Hominids to Homo sapiens
• Hominids=human like walked upright 4 million BC
• Australopithecus “Lucy”=small brain no tools, 3.5 million years ago
• Homo habilis “handy Human” 2.5-1.6 million years ago developed
and used tools
• Homo erectus “upright humans” 1.8-100,000 yeas ago human
proportions, arms and legs first to leave Africa
• Homo Sapiens “wise Humans” 200,000 years ago rapid brain
growth mastered fire
• Neanderthals 100,000-30,000 BC moved throughout modern day
Europe…made clothes from animal skins, buried dead, many stone
tools
• Homo Sapiens Sapiens150,000-200,000 years ago-similar to
humans today…found throughout Africa….replaced Neanderthals,
historians believe Homo Sapiens Sapiens replaced Neanderthals
The End of the Neolithic Age
• By 4000 BC craftsmen had discovered by
heating some rocks they would turn to liquid.
• Once this liquid cooled it hardened into a
much more durable tool that not only was not
only more effective digging tool but it lasted
longer.
• So these crafts people developed molds to
create tools that were more efficient
Bronze Age
• 3000 BC – 1200 BC
• Artisans in Asia discovered that if you
combined copper and tin created bronze.
• A more durable sustainable substance that
made life easier, and helped develop these
civilization into farming communities
Iron Age
• After 1000 BC
• Iron tools that were better than the bronze
predecessor